Spring 2027

The Dark Side of the Universe: the Great Cosmic Mysteries From Black Holes to Dark Energy

Explores black holes, dark matter, and dark energy, covering spacetime warping, plasma beams, cosmic acceleration, and fundamental laws governing the universe's fate.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Nicholas Stone3.7/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Christy Tremonti

The format included two asynchronous lectures per week with two quizzes each, followed by a small group discussion.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Evaluate hypotheses to explain astronomical observations

  • Write basic scientific prose for a variety of lay audiences

  • Understand and apply--qualitatively--the scientific basis of Newtonian Gravity and Relativity

  • Understand and apply the basics of cold-dark matter big-bang cosmology

  • Understand and articulate evidence for dark matter, dark energy, and black holes

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
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All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

None

  • None
ASTRON 170

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree
  • None

Professors

Spring 2027
Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 5.00/5 from 1 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2025: 3.51 GPA, 85.7% A/AB (n=49 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.13 GPA, 48.8% A/AB (n=43 letter grades). Includes jointly taught sections.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

CHRISTINA TREMONTI is recorded teaching in Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Fall 2023. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

NICHOLAS STONE is recorded teaching in Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 1000

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Christy Tremonti

Christy Tremonti taught this course with engaging content and a supportive attitude, which students found worth taking.

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2023: 3.17 GPA, 48.9% A/AB (n=47 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.51 GPA, 85.7% A/AB (n=49 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.13 GPA, 48.8% A/AB (n=43 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Christy Tremonti

The format included two asynchronous lectures per week with two quizzes each, followed by a small group discussion.

Past student reviews · Christy Tremonti

One student found the exams challenging because they were long-answer and required memorizing lecture material.

Topics

  • Black holes, dark matter, and dark energy
  • Spacetime warping and plasma beams around black holes
  • Cosmic acceleration and unknown forms of energy
  • Fundamental laws of nature from GPS to the universe's fate

Skills

  • Evaluate hypotheses to explain astronomical observations
  • Qualitatively understand and apply Newtonian Gravity and Relativity
  • Apply the basics of cold-dark matter big-bang cosmology
  • Articulate evidence for dark matter, dark energy, and black holes

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records
ASTRON 170 · Spring 2027

The Dark Side of the Universe: The Great Cosmic Mysteries from Black Holes to Dark Energy

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:188:025316",
    "course_id": "ASTRON 170",
    "course_uid": "course_5cb42a4a5820bb5fc0415b15",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "025316",
    "source_subject_id": "188",
    "title": "The Dark Side of the Universe: The Great Cosmic Mysteries from Black Holes to Dark Energy",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Not Applicable"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "56c9ca5a1eb51bb2d66743faff06ad51dc61e28830ffc5703caba77be3802024",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}